Food: Starting with Wonton Noodles

A new day begins, and Zhou Yu wakes up refreshed, seemingly having forgotten his affected manner the previous night.

Today is Thursday, and after two days, it's time to start running again.

When Zhou Yu got up, the sky was just beginning to lighten, and Cao Xuezhen hadn't even started cooking breakfast yet.

As Zhou Yu stepped out of the living room, he smelled a familiar fishy odor.

This is the golden pomfret that my brother-in-law, Wu Hongyu, brought over yesterday afternoon.

Taking advantage of the northerly winds these past two days, Cao Xuezhen pickled the food slightly and hung it out to dry on the balcony, not bringing it in at night.

Life in coastal cities is inseparable from seafood, especially salted fish.

However, people in G City don't really like completely dried salted fish; they prefer a semi-dried preparation.

Golden pomfret is the most popular semi-dried salted fish.

Locals will cut the golden pomfret in half lengthwise, creating a shape that allows the pieces of fish to be stuck together.

Slightly marinate with sea salt, then hang it up to dry in the north wind for about one or two days until the fish oil is extracted. Then it can be stored in the refrigerator.

Golden pomfret prepared this way can be steamed or pan-fried. In addition to being easier to store, it also has a plum-like aroma compared to fresh fish.

Golden pomfret has firm flesh, so fresh pomfret is not as popular as salted pomfret.

Cao Xuezhen especially loved to eat dried golden pomfret, so Wu Hongyu would often bring some over for Cao Xuezhen to dry.

Zhou Yu, smelling strongly of salted fish, arrived at the riverside park again.

Mornings remain the peak time for middle-aged people to go for a run.

But to his surprise, when he started warming up, he ran into Chen Mingyuan, who he had run with before.

Chen Mingyuan clearly remembered Zhou Yu as well. During warm-up, he took the initiative to greet Zhou Yu: "Handsome, good morning! I haven't seen you running these past few days."

"Good morning, I now run twice a week," Zhou Yu said.

"Haha, no wonder, are you resuming training now?"

Chen Mingyuan still vividly remembered Zhou Yu's performance last time.

Therefore, he subconsciously thought that Zhou Yu was a veteran runner who often went on long-distance runs, but had been exercising less lately.

"No, I'm a complete beginner. I've never run before. I just recently thought about running to improve my fitness."

"Your physique is quite good. You were able to run five kilometers right after you started running," Chen Mingyuan said.

People's physical condition is generally not very good nowadays. If they can run three kilometers, they are considered to be above average among ordinary people.

Chen Mingyuan's usual pace for a 5-kilometer run is around 5 minutes per kilometer, which is naturally considered amateurish in the long-distance running world.

(Five minutes means running one kilometer in five minutes)

However, for the average runner, without deliberate training and a consistent running habit for one or two years, it is really not easy to achieve this.

Chen Mingyuan was naturally quite surprised that Zhou Yu could run a bit and then walk a bit, maintaining a speed similar to his own average speed.

He couldn't help but say, "Handsome, you have a real talent for long-distance running! Haven't you ever thought about training to run a marathon?"

Zhou Yu shook his head.

Marathon? Forget about it.

He's running now only to unlock the basic chef skill rewarded by the system.

Seeing Zhou Yu shake his head, Chen Mingyuan didn't say much. After all, a marathon is an extreme sport and not very healthy.

He himself, after running for so many years, has never thought about running a marathon. At most, he'll occasionally run a 10km run once or twice.

He picked up the water bottle, took a sip, and put the water into his small backpack.

Then he got up, looked left and right, picked up his small backpack, and stuffed it into one of the flower beds near the track.

Seeing Zhou Yu looking over, he smiled and said, "You've just started running, so you might not know, but running is the easiest way to lose things. Even a bottle of water that's been drunk from can easily disappear."

"So you need to find a secluded place to hide your things. The only problem is that sometimes you hide them so well that you don't even remember where you put them."

Zhou Yu hadn't really thought of that. When he came here for a run a couple of days ago, he hadn't even brought water with him, so he was quite thirsty afterward.

This time, he bought a bottle of mineral water, and after only a few sips, he couldn't help but ask, "Isn't it safe to drink water that's already been drunk from?"

Chen Mingyuan gave Zhou Yu a knowing look.

Seeing Chen Mingyuan's reaction, Zhou Yu also hid the water somewhere.

Water isn't expensive, but if it gets stolen, it's really tough to have no water to drink.

But are there really people this twisted? Stealing water they've already drunk?

After starting to run, Zhou Yu maintained the same style as the previous two days, running a bit and then walking a bit.

Compared to the previous two days, he was running longer and walking shorter distances.

Chen Mingyuan remained as steady as ever, maintaining his usual pace.

Then, just like last time, he kept being overtaken by Zhou Yu, and kept leaving Zhou Yu far behind while Zhou Yu was walking, and so on.

After finishing their run, both of them opted to take a slow walk to relax.

Although he had already witnessed it once, Chen Mingyuan was still amazed by Zhou Yu's physique.

When the two returned to where they started, Chen Mingyuan, still a little out of breath, looked at Zhou Yu, who had clearly recovered, with admiration.

"Handsome guy, with your physique, it's a real waste that you're not training for marathons!"

Before Zhou Yu could answer, he started looking for his small backpack.

It seems I've forgotten where I put it again.

Zhou Yu had already taken a few sips of water. He pointed to one of the flowerbeds and said, "Is it over there?"

Chen Mingyuan followed the direction Zhou Yu was pointing and exclaimed, "Ah! Found it!"

He smiled at Zhou Yu and said, "Thank you so much. All these flowerbeds look the same color, it's really hard to tell them apart. My name is Chen Mingyuan. We've been running together for so long, and I still don't know your name."

"Zhou Yu".

"Zhou Yu, have you had breakfast yet? Would you like to have breakfast together? Let me tell you, there's a stall nearby that sells really delicious sticky rice chicken."

Chen Mingyuan was visibly happy to have found his backpack. Before, when he was traveling alone, he often had to spend a long time looking for things. Now that he knew Zhou Yu, he would obviously save time looking for his backpack.

After thinking it over, Zhou Yu agreed.

This is quite a special coincidence; I've met the same person twice since I came here, and we even run together sometimes.

Seeing that Zhou Yu had agreed, Chen Mingyuan became more talkative.

"Hey, you can probably tell I'm not from Lingnan, right? To be honest, the food here in Lingnan is really plentiful and delicious. It's just that sometimes it's a bit strange. People eat rice in the morning but have porridge for dinner. I wasn't used to it when I first came here, but it's really delicious."

"Huh? What do you mean, breakfast?" Zhou Yu was a little confused by Chen Mingyuan's question.

Zhou Yu understood that they would have porridge for dinner.

But what the heck is breakfast?